A Modest Proposal Study Guide

In 1729 Jonathan Swift published his work that carried an immensely long title but has become known under “A Modest Proposal” name. The book is a major social text exploring the living conditions in Ireland and the attitude towards the Irish from other nationalities.

Today it’s hard to imagine a situation in which a parent would sell his kid, but this concept is exactly what prompted the author to write this book. It’s a satirical work that showed how little tolerance society had for the poor people.

Think about it for a moment: the world without kids would be so much better. Children are crazy. They scream and they annoy people. They talk to themselves, they have friends and bring them over to the house. They suck the thumb and believe in the wardrobe monsters.

But most importantly, kids cost money. It’s expensive to dress them, feed them and take them to school. So why not sell them to rich people? The author explores in great depth the ways to prepare a child for a sale and even best ways to cook him.

It would solve so many problems: the number of poor people would go down, the overpopulation would no longer be a problem, the taxes would be lowered, the mothers would work and earn more, not even talking about the potential growth of GDP!

This idea isn’t as terrible as it might seem at a first glance. Maybe for a child it’s better to be eaten than to live in this cruel world. To live in the world, where the child would be confronted with poverty, pain, suffering, humiliation, and loss.

The satire and criticism in the book are direct and blunt. The reader finds himself thirsty for more irony because it’s absurd and genius at the same time. But this is the last of Swift’s books about Ireland. So enjoy it to the fullest!

In Jonathan Swift's article, 'A Modest Proposal' the author proposes an idea to relieve the country of Ireland from the burden of poor people on its society (Swift, 1729). He suggests opening up a market to sell one year old children from poverty-stricken families and allowing them to...

Jonathan Swift's 1729 essay, A Modest Proposal, was a true example of satire at its best. Many readers at the time rejected the essay because they failed to understand the irony. It is presently one of the most well known works of satire and is a classic example of the technique most commonly...

A Modest Proposal for Marijuana

Each year the United States government documents drug related deaths in our country, breaking the deaths down into categories of cause. These categories include tobacco, alcohol, prescription medications, illegal drug, and of course marijuana related deaths. Every year the number of deaths coming...

A Modest Proposal Reading Response

A Modest Proposal Reading Response Jonathon Swift wrote A Modest Proposal in 1729 describing the very real poverty plaguing the Irish people. He lays out their misfortunes clearly and rationally, and argues, by hard-edged economic reasoning as well as from a self-righteous moral stance, for a way...